Ocean Emerges from Stealth to Protect Enterprises from AI-Powered Email Attacks

Ocean, an agentic email security platform, led by Shay Shwartz and Oran Moyal, has announced its launch from stealth with $28 million in total funding, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from Picture Capital and Cerca Partners. Additional angel investors include Assaf Rappaport (Wiz), Yevgeny Dibrov and Nadir Izrael (Armis), and Dor Knafo (former CEO of Axis Security and General Partner at Cyberstarts), among other leading angel investors.

Ocean is introducing an AI-native email security platform built around autonomous investigation, designed to protect hundreds of thousands of mailboxes while replacing legacy detection-based systems that struggle against modern AI-powered attacks.

Email remains the leading attack vector for enterprises, with over 90% of successful cyberattacks beginning through phishing. AI has transformed spear phishing into a scalable, highly personalized threat that increasingly bypasses traditional detection-based security systems.

“The challenge is no longer detecting malicious emails, but understanding intent within increasingly realistic communication,” said Shay Shwartz, CEO and co-founder of Ocean. “Ocean uses AI agents to investigate every email in context and uncover malicious intent at scale.”

Ocean already replaces legacy detection-based email security systems with autonomous investigation and is securing enterprise environments ranging from Global Fortune 500 companies to organizations such as KAYAK and Headspace.

“We invested in the team and vision because the thesis was undeniable: AI fundamentally changed email security and gave attackers a major advantage overnight,” said Mike Fey, co-founder and CEO of Island. “What stood out was the team’s offensive security background and deep understanding of the threat landscape. AI is uniquely suited to solve this challenge because it can understand language, intent, and context at scale.”

At the core of Ocean is Ray, an autonomous intelligence engine that continuously analyzes emails, incorporates organizational context, and improves decision-making in real time.

By treating every email as an investigated event, the platform enables enterprises to identify hidden threats within seemingly legitimate communication, move beyond traditional pattern-matching approaches, and automate investigation and response workflows to reduce operational burden and improve security team efficiency.

“We look for companies built around moments when a market’s core assumptions are breaking,” said David Gussarsky of Lightspeed Venture Partners. “Email security is at such a moment, as the scale and realism of modern attacks force organizations to rethink existing strategies. Ocean stood out for its technical approach, clear vision, and the team’s deep expertise across AI, offensive security, and defensive email security.”

Ocean will use the new funding to expand its AI research and development efforts, strengthen its AI-native infrastructure, and continue building a platform powered by AI agents across every layer, from product to operations.